bell hooks, one of America's leading black intellectuals, is also one of our most clear-eyed and penetrating analysts of culture. Outlaw Culture gives us hooks on many of the most important subjects of the contemporary scene, from date rape, censorship, and ideas of race and beauty, to gansta rap, the dilemmas of feminism, and the rise of black intellectuals. Using the mix of essays and sometimes highly personal dialogues for which she is well known, hooks takes on Spike Lee and Naomi Wolf, Malcolm X and Madonna, Camille Paglia, Jean-Michel Basquiat and Ice Cube, and the films The Bodygaurd and The Crying Game. She speaks movingly about male violence against women, about black self-hatred, and about the ways an oppressive society creates its outlaws.